I Run, For Life!

As I’m sitting at a coffee shop in central Glasgow, I can’t help but think that wow, I have made it! I’ve arrived in Glasgow yesterday to take part in the Great Scottish Run this Sunday. I’ll be running the half-marathon route as part of my training for the full marathon I’ll be doing in 4 weeks around Loch Ness. Well, it’s not really part of my training, but it’s a great excuse to come down here and enjoy the city for the weekend.

I had made up my mind about the Great Scottish Run just a few days ago when I was flipping through a copy of the Runner’s World magazine I got for my train ride from Inverness to Pitlochry. I saw the ad for the race and thought, why not? The timing couldn’t have been more perfect: exactly 4 weeks before my marathon on October 4^th. Since I already run half-marathon distances (21k or 13.1 miles) as part of my training, why not run one in an official race? (And check out one more Scottish city in the meantime.)

I really have to regularly pinch myself these days, because my crazy ramblings from months ago are coming true and sometimes it is hard to believe that they are my reality. I say ‘crazy ramblings’, because that’s how it must have sounded in various emails and conversations with my friends and family a year ago.

At that time I was working for an e-commerce agency in central London and I was kind of unsettled. I didn’t think it was the right place for me; I didn’t like the office routine, the commute, the crowd. Instead of taking the tube or a bus to work, I usually cycled or just walked once I moved closer to the office to avoid traffic jams and the claustrophobic tube trains. I just wanted to feel the air on my face and not the breath of the passenger next to me.

And one day a thought popped into my head: how about the ultimate freedom? How about… running?! That moment I just had a vision of me running through wide open spaces, of covering great distances on foot without elbowing anyone in the process (and I probably drooled over my office keyboard). At the time the ‘great distance’ meant 10 miles and up as I could barely run 3 without the need to call it a day, but hey, it was all ahead of me.

Despite my terrible running record, I started to search for running events around the world. I browsed different races, from 5k’s to ultras, and found the marathon distance strangely appealing. I’m not really sure why, because 10k or a half-marathon was definitely more suitable to start from at my level of fitness, but 26 miles (or 42k) seemed like the perfect distance to aim at. I guess it was like a doorstep to running these ‘great distances’ I imagined: ultra marathons. Once I became comfortable with the marathon, I could venture out into the wild world of long distance running.

As I browsed through a list of marathons, one race suddenly struck a chord with me: the Loch Ness Marathon. I read that the route is around Loch Ness in the Scottish Highlands and immediately felt that this was exactly where I wanted to run. I had never been to Scotland before, but I found myself strangely attracted to the place.

The registration opened a few weeks later, in January 2010. When I completed my entry form, I had already quit my job and was a few days from starting my month-long trip to Brazil followed by a month-long trip to the United States to visit my college friends (I had spent 4 years in Western Pennsylvania) and venture out West, where I had a taste of what it feels to be running in wide open spaces.

When I was hiking through Zion National Park in Utah, I was overwhelmed by the incredible beauty of the canyons and couldn’t stop myself from bursting into a run. It wasn’t a long run, but I felt like a dog released from her leash outside of city limits. I simply felt so happy and free!

When I got to Scotland a month ago, I couldn’t believe how right it felt and how happy I still was, even though I was pursuing some crazy ramblings of a bored office worker at her lunch break. It is quite overwhelming to watch it happen, to have my dreams materialize right in front of my eyes.

Perhaps it might not seem like a big deal to you - there are plenty of people running marathons. But for me it is incredible that I have decided to follow my crazy heart instead of sticking to what I had known. And it feels amazing; it is pure joy!

Next time you feel an urge to do something out of the ordinary, don’t shrug it off. Mull it over and if the urge is still there, no matter how crazy it may seem, follow it; and taste the happiness.

(photo: taken by my boyfriend in Bryce Canyon National Park, Utah, in March 2009)